This association will enable financial institutions to get an insight into transactional behaviour of consumers who are not part of credit bureau rankings.

KM Nanaiah, Country Leader, Equifax India and MEA said that the aim was to solve the issue of broader credit access for people. “This would work on a consent model where applicants who are not present in the credit bureau data can allow lenders to look at other digital transactions and patterns,” he said.

It is estimated that about 75% of the population in India has never taken a loan. Consumer loan accounts for almost one-fifth of new loan accounts opened.

Through this collaboration, Equifax and PayU are trying to bring in this segment into the credit fold. This would provide financial institutions and lender more insights into consumer behaviour by providing data that can be incorporated into the digital lending process.

“Consumer credit market in India has a lot of scope for growth and this partnership will serve the untapped potential. This innovative product is aligned with our vision of supporting the credit ecosystem including banks, NBFCs, and Fin-techs in order to provide seamless credit access to millions of underserved customers. Furthermore, this provides further validation of our understanding of customer’s digital behavior and how same can be leveraged to drive credit access to consumers.” said Jitendra Gupta, MD, PayU India.

Equifax is a global information solution provider of predictive analytics. PayU is a fintech company that provides payment technology to online merchants and is a part of Naspers.